Secret vices

I recently came across an an article about people posting lists of books they claim to have changed their lives. It seems that, like in social media in general people tend to list books they'd like to have changed their lives rather than the books that actually have. In short, it's cooler to list books that are difficult rather than books you actually like to read. So on the list you're more likely to find David Foster Wallace than John Grisham...

Now I've done my fair share of difficult reading, having muddled through the aforementioned Foster Wallace as well as Joyce's Ulysses and some B.S. Johnson just to mention a few. Now none of these books I felt changed my life one bit, I found them difficult and at times just plain boring. Proust's mammoth epic In search of Lost Time on the other hand kept me in its grip from the second book onwards right till the end, so I haven't found all "difficult" books equally difficult.

But when it comes to really enjoying yourself with a book it's best to find one that keeps you entertained and reels you in from the first page. The search for that book can be a painstaking job and so sometimes the best thing to do is just to fall back on old favorites. Since most of us try to look cool we never boast on our light reading, but...

For me, the best thing I can do on a hot summers day is to pick up a friendly, familiar detective story and just lazy my day away in the sun reading about a neat murder taking place in a nice upper class English environment. None of the new psychological, violent, dark murder mysteries for me! I'm all for your Agatha Christie's and Conan Doyle's and Ngaio Marsh's and Dorothy L. Sayers' etc.

It's not cool to like Agatha Christie & co. Not at all. Most people who like to read, I've found, have a disliking towards Christie, saying her books are not that well written nor realistic. Well, the so called realistic crime novel just is a little too much for me, especially while enjoying a relaxing summer's day. The true value of a nice Agatha Christie lies in the complete harmlessness of the books - the murder is always neat, the suspects well behaved and you can trust there to be plenty of soothing tea.

Now am I saying Agatha Christie changed my life? Perhaps not. At least not in the sense that I’d gotten any deep life lessons from her books. But perhaps reading Agatha Christie has changed me in the sense that her books have helped me get some tough times. Reading a familiar book is like comfort food, you know how it makes you feel and mostly that’s happy and comforted. 

On a regular day I can read a “difficult” book like nobody’s business but then comes the odd day when you just need to go back to your old friends. It could be because the sun is shining and you want to just enjoy yourself or it could be that you just need to feel safe with a book you know. 

For some reason it seems more socially acceptable to watch the Christie adaptations on TV than reading the actual books (Kenneth Branagh had taken Christie to a whole new level) but I'm not one to care for social pressure, I promote my guilty secret openly! No TV adaptations for me - I prefer the real thing.